THE ONLY EASY DAY IS YESTERDAY

"The Journey of Jeremy Keller"

By OldScout

Part 16

The Wilmont farm was dead quiet. Jeremy got out the truck

and approached the house slowly, assessing the scene. The front yard

was matted with motorcycle tracks and loose laundry rolled in the wind

on the side yard. Curtains flapped out of a broken window on the

second floor above the porch.

Jeremy pulled the revolver from his ankle holster and entered

the house slowly. He knew that whoever had been here was gone, but

the reaction was natural. Laying just inside the door against the wall

was Henry Wilmont with two bullet holes in his chest. Blood streaked

across the floor from where he had fallen to where his body had been

pushed aside.

In the kitchen, Jeremy could see Mrs. Jordon slumped sideways

across the table, her gray hair matted with blood. A knife in her hand

was still in stuck in the pie. Jeremy slowly approached the kitchen and

examined the scene. A scoop had been taken out of the middle of the

pie, apparently by hand. Chunks of the pie were also splattered over the

body of the old woman.

Swallowing hard Jeremy turned away from the kitchen then saw

that the sword was out of its mounting. He scanned the front room and

spotted the weapon laying near the stairs to the second floor. Jeremy

approached the weapon then heard water running upstairs.

At the top of the stairs, Jeremy found only one door open.

Glancing in, he first thought the bed had red sheets on it then realized

they were originally white. He looked more closely at the room and

almost lost his breakfast. There was blood everywhere, the bed was

soaked, there were splatters on the walls, floor and the ceiling. Looking

at the ceiling, Jeremy even thought he could see bloody hand prints

above the bed. Everything else in the room was destroyed, clothes and

bedding were scattered everywhere, he even thought he recognized the

cotton dress Mandy had been wearing. It was hard to tell, since it was

shredded and soaked with blood. The room also stank, not only of the

blood and gore, but of urine and other foul odors.

The thought of Mandy brought Jeremy out of his daze. He

could feel her presence from the quickening then turned toward the

sound of water which had originally brought him up here. Leading out

of the bedroom and across the floor to the bathroom was a messy trail of

bloody foot prints.

Jeremy pushed the bathroom door open, not knowing exactly

what he would find. The room was covered with blood stained water,

bloody towels were scattered everywhere and Mandy stood naked in the

bath tub letting the water wash over her. Water splatter to floor around

the claw foot tub.

Mandy turned and looked at Jeremy "You didn't tell me you had

friends." she whispered. Her body was pale and blue like a corpse.

Bright red scars criss-crossed all over her flesh. The remaining clumps

of her long hair straggled across her back.

"I didn't think they would come looking for me." he stammered.

"And I never thought them capable of this."

"They saw the bike in the old barn." Mandy said through the

stream of water running over her face. "There's a linen closet down the

hall, get me some fresh towels."

Jeremy holstered the pistol and fetched the towels as Mandy

stepped out of the tub. She took one of the towels and started drying

herself then headed down the hall toward one of the other bedrooms.

She wasn't even trying to cover herself from Jeremy.

"Bring the towels in here." she said as she entered the room.

"I'm going to need some clothes. In the back of my walk-in closet is an

old hutch, bring me the bottom drawer."

Jeremy hesitated going into the bedroom, but sure as hell didn't

want Mandy to have to go back in. He worked his way into the room

and fetched what she wanted. Fifteen minutes after going into the bed

room Mandy emerged.

Mandy had cut off her remaining hair leaving it shorter then

Jeremy's. She wore black jeans, a gray t-shirt and a large, black

chamois shirt, opened like a jacket. She walked by Jeremy without

acknowledging him then said as she reached the top of the stairs "I'm

going to need your help in the basement."

Jeremy followed the woman into the old basement of the

farmhouse. She looked around the seldom used area. "When we built

this place a hundred years ago, I swore I'd put away my sword for good.

I was tired of playing the game and fighting for my life at every turn."

Mandy rummaged in a corner for a pry-bar and handed it to

Jeremy. She then picked another heavy bar for herself. Mandy

indicated one of the large pieces of slate that made up the floor and the

two started working their tools to dislodge the stone. Soon the rock was

loosened enough to move it enough to reveal a long wooden box.

The woman pushed past Jeremy and lifted the box out of the

hole and put it on a nearby table. In it was an old oiled cloth which she

unfolded revealing an old sword and two daggers. The sword was

plain and straight with just a few non-descript designs carved into the

handle. The blade was a simple two sided weapon that had been forged

smooth, but never polished to a shine. The two daggers matched the

style of the sword one was small, about eight inches from tip of the

blade to the butt of the handle. The other was larger, around twelve

inches long.

Mandy lifted the sword from the box and swung it around a bit.

"This was my father's sword." she said with a somber look in her eyes.

"I thought I had buried this part of my life forever." She then removed

the daggers and closed the box. She quickly stashed the daggers under

her shirt. As she lifted the tail of the shirt, Jeremy realized she was

wearing sheaths for the two weapons, one, a belt sheath secured across

her waist and the other strapped across her back for the longer knife.

"Lets go" she said, "I think they were heading west."

"Your going after them?" Jeremy said, not really surprised.

"They killed my grandson and a woman who was once my best

friend." She shivered a bit "Not to mention what those animals did to

me." She then looked at the young man "If you don't have the stomach

for what needs to be done, I'll understand."

"They came here looking for me, after I warned them to stay

away. I would be going after them no matter what." Jeremy replied.

"Do you have a sword?" Mandy asked as they climbed back up

to the ground floor.

Jeremy lifted the lid to the box seat and pulled his duffel out. "I

don't play the game." he said, "I just protect myself the only way I

know." He then pulled the shotgun out of the bag and started loading

shells into it.

to be continued..............